From the recordings When I Loved Her and Beauty of the World
This is a very personal song about yet another woman, Mary Ellen, we lost to breast cancer this year. Many families have been crunched by this terrible affliction and, in my case, Mary Ellen was also the mother of my two adult children. The fact that we ended our marriage many years ago, while our two boys were both pretty young, doesn't diminish the fact that she was an important person in my life and I still love her, as I always have, in a crazy way. In fact, when we first got together I remember the Paul Young song "I Go Crazy" was in heavy rotation on the radio. Music continues to stream through my life and I hope this song helps to connect me with the man I was "When I Loved Her".
Lyrics
I don’t wanna go home again
To feel her memory breathe.
A silent train’s comin’ ‘round the bend
And she is bound to leave.
She’s hard to take like medicine.
It’s hard to explain what happened then
When I loved her.
CHORUS:
WHEN I LOVED HER.
When I held her in my arms and told her I’d always be there.
Was I crazy WHEN I LOVED HER?
No more crazy than I am today.
No more crazy, no more crazy than I am today
WHEN I LOVED HER.
In her day she tried to change the world
But the world wouldn’t hear.
There’s no sense in keepin’ score
When our time is near.
She taught me things I should have known.
That is why a family’s grown
All around her.
REPEAT CHORUS
Now she’s lyin’ there in front of me
Not the sailor she once was.
But as long as there’s a windy sea
She’ll be doin’ what a captain does.
I haven’t cried with her in years.
It’s no surprise there are tears
Because I love her.
REPEAT CHORUS
WHEN I LOVED HER.
WHEN I LOVED HER.
WHEN I LOVED HER.